Monday, March 30, 2015

Our Plastic, Their Death - The Great Pacific Garbage Patch

By: Raymond Tony Chang Jr., Cornell University

The word “garbage,” as normally described, can easily mislead people into the thought of the Great Pacific Garbage Patch as a visible area of marine debris including items such as glass bottles and other large consumer products. This is simply not the case. Much of the mentioned debris actually refers to the even smaller bits of floatable plastics. Since much of the plastic is made up of material that are not biodegradable, much of the debris accumulate over the years – forming what we now know as the Great Pacific Garbage Patch. Over time, plastics break into tinier and tinier pieces that are not normally visible to the naked eye. This immense amount of marine debris is a major component to the destruction of oceanic creatures living in these areas. For example, loggerhead seas turtles tend to mistaken floating plastic bags for jellyfish, their favorite food (Rutledge). Similarly, mammals that live around the gyre such as the albatrosses have been found with six-pack plastic soda rings choking their neck (Rutledge). The effect of marine debris circulating these Hawaiian Islands in this extremely large gyre is obvious in its harm towards marine animals and other mammals that live in the area.

The Northern Pacific Subtropical Convergence zone of the GPGP lies exactly above the Hawaiian Archipelago. In fact, this strand of Island is home to nearly 3 million birds, including the world’s largest population of Laysan Albatross (Eidt, 2012). The Midway Atoll, lying in the middle of the Hawaiian Archipelago, is home to these Albatross birds. As the name suggests, the Midway Atoll is located roughly equidistant between North America and Asia. The location of the Midway is also, right in the center of the North Pacific Gyre. The Midway Atoll is a remote, unincorporated U.S. territory where the Battle of Midway occurred in 1942. This ring of volcanic islands and reefs is now home to millions birds, “including 250 different marine species that populate the nearby reefs and lagoons” (Eidt, 2012).

However, the beautiful Midway Atoll is now continuously destroyed by the 20 tons of plastic trash that float onto the shores of the islands each year (Chan, 2012). “Entanglement of plastics has been reported in 56 species of marine and coastal birds” (GreenPeace). Similarly, the numerous amounts of species living on these islands have all been greatly affected by the 90% plastic that come from land. “Of the 500,000 albatross chicks born here each year, about 200,000 die, mostly from dehydration or starvation”(Eidt, 2012). Recently, a two-year research funded by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency examined the death of albatross chicks and adults in this region. Studies show that albatross chicks die from either dehydration or starvation of food; however, albatross chicks that are found dehydrated had twice as much plastic in their stomach compared to albatross chicks that died from other reasons. Similarly, adult albatross often mistaken miniature plastic products such as bottle caps and lighters for food. “Hence, the birds swallow the junk, that perforates their stomach or blocks their esophagus or gizzard, leading to inability to eat, often leading to death” (Eidt, 2012). Not only are the albatross species affected, other studies suggested “up to 1 million seabirds choke or get tangled in plastic nets every year” (Eidt, 2012).

Unfortunately, since adult Laysan Albatross mistaken plastic for food, they end up feeding these broken up pieces of plastics to their young. The biggest threat is thus the ingestion of these plastics when it blocks the digestive track of albatross. “The world's plastic debris and other refuse is often digested by wildlife and kills an estimated 1 million seabirds per year, according to the United Nations Environment Programme” (Diamond, 2013). In addition, debris accumulated in the stomach can give the bird a false sense of fullness, resulting in the bird to stop eating and malnutrition. The ingestion of sharp objects can also damage the linings of the gut of these birds resulting in infection, pain, or even death. When animals ingest plastics, “it is possible that hazardous chemicals in the plastics may leach out and be absorbed into the animal’s body” (GreenPeace). The ingestion of these chemicals could potentially cause toxic effects to the Albatross resulting in severe pain within. Lastly, one study reported “90% of chicks surveyed had some sort of plastic debris in their upper gastrointestinal tract” (GreenPeace).

Will marine animals, specifically the local birds of the Midway Atoll such as the Laysan Albatross become extinct in the next few years? It is up to the leading world super powers of the century, the United States of America and China, to create economical bylaws in order to discontinue the illegal dumping and contamination of the oceans, as well as improving the nature and habitat of the Midway Atoll.

Sunday, March 29, 2015

Plastics bottles. Plastic bags. Plastic everything. As an individual walking down the busy roads of Shanghai city made me think - "where do all our trash go?" Countless times have I seen our supposed good citizens (sometimes) dump their used plastic bottles into the recycling bins. Countless times have I witnessed the life-filled plastic bag being tossed in the wind. Countless times have I discovered that tiny plastic lighter hiding in the bottom corner of a tree. I wrote an 18 research paper on the Great Pacific Garbage Patch back in high school focusing on evaluating economic and political strategies of the superpowers and their position to help endangered species such as the Albatross who's habitat have been overflowed by the mountainous piles of garbage that humans have created. It's truly amazing to finally see young individuals, empowered to change and make our world a better place, design innovations so truly amazing as such....

"Dutch teenager and aerospace engineering student, BOYAN SLAT, 19, went on a diving vacation to Greece and was horrified to see more floating plastic bags than fish in the beautiful blue waters. He also found large amounts of colored plastic shards mixed in the sand on the beaches, and noticed that there were relatively few red plastic shards. He discovered that these had been eaten by birds and fish because they looked like flesh. These animals, he knew, would eventually die a slow and painful death.

Since then, Boyan has been on an ambitious mission to develop a solution to clean up the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, proposing in the following TEDx Talk that a series of large Manta ray shaped platforms be affixed in the waters, which - powered by the oceanic currents themselves - will be able to extract the plastic garbage on their own, at tremendous savings in terms of money, energy, and labor."-https://www.facebook.com/theecopeople/posts/693995080636628

About Me

A student-athlete and entrepreneur, Raymond Tony Chang Jr. is currently pursuing a business degree at Cornell University, where he is a member of the Phi Alpha Delta law fraternity. Raymond Tony Chang Jr. is also a member of the school’s NCAA Division I track and field team, which requires approximately 20 hours a week of training for various sprinting events. Apart from his athletic commitments, Raymond Tony Chang Jr. has participated in several entrepreneurial endeavors during his undergraduate career. He serves as the United States marketing and sales director for PinCube, a cube-shaped battery charger that can fully charge an iPhone in just one hour and is capable of charging multiple devices simultaneously. He also cofounded BookExchange by Dean'sList, an app that helps students achieve the best prices for buying and selling textbooks on campus. In his free time, he enjoys drawing, singing, and playing a number of instruments, including the guitar, piano, drums, and bass. Through his affiliation with AMIS, an international musical honor society, he has traveled extensively to such destinations as Dubai, Kuala Lumpur, and various European cities. He additionally enjoys cooking and creates meals consisting of several courses for his close friends

From 2012 to 2014, Mr. Chang served as an
UnderArmour ambassador, in which role he represented the athletic brand
at its main Grand Gateway store location and utilized his English
fluency to describe UnderArmour fabric and technology to international
customers. He also organized a 2013 event with Olympic swimmer Michael
Phelps and achieved the store’s highest sales for several consecutive
months. Raymond Tony Chang Jr. was involved in a number of charity musical events in high school, including Music for Hope, which benefitted Habitat for Humanity, and the cancer-awareness concert Relay for Life. The latter fundraiser had a particularly important meaning for him, as his grandmother battled the disease.